


if i see you in my dreams tonight

by savingophelia (briennesbeauty)



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: F/F, Post-Finale, Two Shot, canon compliant for once, emma is gay and sad, for real don't read this it's just sad, mentions of captain std, regina needs love, that explains it, this is just sadness and angst, why did I write this
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-08-08
Updated: 2018-08-08
Packaged: 2019-06-23 23:49:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,753
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15617739
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/briennesbeauty/pseuds/savingophelia
Summary: A lump appears in Emma’s throat. She swallows. “I’m sleeping.”“You’re dreaming,” Regina whispers, and her voice trembles, just a little. “It’s something entirely different.”months into their separate happy endings, emma and regina still dream of each other.





	if i see you in my dreams tonight

**Author's Note:**

> hi everyone this is really miserable get out while you can.
> 
> if however, like me, you are feeling a little bit angsty... this is a two-shot. so this first chapter centres around emma and her 'happy ending' and dreams, and the second will centre around regina's.

Her happy ending is a quiet one. 

The days after the Black Fairy’s final battle are mostly filled with cleaning up, counting casualties, and making long-needed apologies. For a week or so, they barely have time to think. But once the dust settles, Emma Swan is expected to do the same. 

It feels strange to go home after everything that’s happened. Not that the big house on the corner with the telescope and the black leather jackets hanging in the wardrobe really feels like _home_ , exactly. The way she thought home would feel. But then again, maybe it does. She’s no expert. 

So Emma tries her best to hang up her sword and the word _saviour_ , for good. 

She begins a routine. 

Every day, Emma jerks awake early. She always slept late before. Now she’s up before the alarm, before Killian – always snoring softly the far side of the bed. The sight of him there still makes her chest feel strange. Heavy. But she’s used to that now. She guesses that’s love.

She gets out of bed early, before the weekday alarm, and makes herself a coffee. Emma gets through a lot of coffee these days. She leans against the kitchen counter while the kettle boils, looking out the window and watching a bird play through the branches of the tree outside. 

It’s weird, but she thinks she likes those quiet moments sandwiched between night and day. Between something and being something else. 

But eventually, irrevocably, Killian will wake up and trudge downstairs yawning, and put on the TV and Emma will put on her best self. That sounds like a cheesy infomercial, or Dr Phil, but that’s how she’s come to think of it. This thing she does where she makes a coffee and makes herself smile, smile, _smile_. Reminds herself this is everything she’s ever wanted. It is. 

She feels different when she’s alone, different to how she feels when she’s with Hook or her parents or even Henry these days. Like she can let herself breathe. 

She’ll usually go to work before Hook, who’s been made a deputy at the station. She’s not quite sure why. Apparently legal qualifications don’t stand for much in the new Storybrooke. Whatever. He wanted to work with her, and that’s what married couples do, isn’t it? So that’s what she does. 

Emma works. She fills in forms and eats greasy grilled cheese out of the paper bag on her desk. She tells off teenage vandals and clips the gold star to her belt every morning. She sees her parents, helps her dad put together Ikea furniture for their new house. She has Granny’s with her mom, and she picks Henry up from school. She teaches him to fish, and to Google hard questions about algebra. 

In her own way, she guesses, she gets on with her life. 

Her life. Her _happy_ life. 

That’s what it is. 

In spite of the weight that seems to permentantly reside in her chest, the bitterness in her mouth before she has her coffee, and the way sometimes she wants to scream or fight something – she _is_ happy. She has a family. Parents, a husband, a son. A job she loves in a town she loves more. 

That’s what happy feels like. Isn’t it? 

In Emma Swan’s epilogue, there are no explosions of hope and love and rainbow magic. There are no dreamy days of soft light and smiles.   
Her happy ending is a quiet one. 

One where there isn’t some great beacon of light, or any earth-shattering, heart-rendering, all-encompassing feelings of love and luck. Because this is the real world. And in the real world, those things don’t exist. 

And that’s okay. 

In her dreams, it’s a different story. 

Every night, Emma half dreads and half looks forward to falling asleep. Honestly, she tries not to think about it in the day. The day is for reality, for half-hearted jokes and uncomfortable blouses and smiles that hurt her cheeks. The day is for Killian Jones. The night is for dreaming. 

Mostly, Emma has the same dream, night after night. She’s standing in a bedroom. It’s always the same, a room she doesn’t know, spacious and dimly lit. She’s tired, heavy, alone. How she feels most of the time when she’s awake, except now it’s more... tangible. More valid.   
In the dream, she sighs and sits on the bed. It’s big and soft and the sheets are plain white cotton. She’s wearing jeans and a tank, boots she hasn’t worn for years, things that make her feel comfortable and herself. She sighs heavily and runs a hand over the soft sheets. 

(She wants to go to sleep. Like she does most days. She wants to go to sleep, and maybe she wants to not wake up. Not to die. No. Just to go to sleep. It would be easier than this, she thinks, in the dream. _This, this_.)

And then, like sunlight –   
Regina. 

She emerges from the darkness around the edge of the room, and where she walks – softly, _softly_ – seems to turn just a little bit brighter. Emma’s not much for dream symbolism or any of that hippie dippy crap but she doesn’t have to think about what that means. For all the darkness in her life, Regina Mills has too often been a source of light. 

Emma’s breath catches in her throat at the sight of her, and she stands up sharply from the bed, like a soldier paying respect to her queen. The dream is detailed; it feels real. Her mouth is dry, but her palms sweat. Her heart races.

“Hey,” Emma says, and she barely recognises her own voice. 

Regina comes closer, and everything about her, the way she moves, has a soft, heavy, candlelit quality that reminds Emma it’s only a dream. The brunette is wearing a short silky robe and none of her usual fierce make-up, like she’s about to go to sleep, or she’s just woken up. Emma thinks it’s funny how she’s never seen her like this, but her subconscious has created such a detailed picture for her. 

A whisper of a smile comes over Regina’s face, and it makes Emma’s heart ache. “Hey,” She says back to her. Her voice is hushed and light, like they’re sharing a secret or a private joke. 

“What are you doing here?” Emma asks, finally. She’s not quite sure where she means – this strange empty room, or here in her head, every night.

Regina’s face breaks into an incredulous smile for a split second, one that makes her huge dark eyes shine with something that doesn’t look entirely like happiness. One perfect eyebrow rises in query. 

“What are you doing?” Once again, Regina has repeated Emma’s own words, but now the question is suddenly loaded with weight that wasn’t there before. 

“I’m... Carrying on.” A lump appears in Emma’s throat. She swallows. “I’m sleeping.”

“You’re dreaming,” Regina whispers, and her voice trembles, just a little. “It’s something entirely different.” 

Emma just looks at her. She looks at her for a long time, in the way she can’t let herself when she’s awake. Lets a heavy smile tug at the corner of her mouth and her heart, lets herself, for once, study the most beautiful woman she’s ever seen in the way she’d really like to. 

They’re close. Closer than they’ve dared to get for a while. She knows it’s only a dream but she can almost smell that familiar hint of high end perfume. Just like it still does in real life, Emma’s heart speeds up, thudding in her chest. Heat prickles up the back of her neck. Her mouth is empty, but her mind is full of words. 

Regina tilts her head, smiling a little. It doesn’t quite reach her eyes. “I miss you.”

“I’m still here,” Emma says, and the words stick in her throat. Even asleep, she can taste the bitterness that goes with lying to herself like this. She tries a smile and it feels even worse. “I see you all the time.”

“Not like you used to.” Regina murmurs softly. For a moment, she looks down, but then her dark eyes lift to meet Emma’s, shining. 

“Oh, Emma.” She sighs, after a long time, and Emma’s heart jerks and twists. Suddenly, they’re close enough for their noses almost to be touching, and Regina’s delicate little hand reaches up to slip against her cheek. And then, almost inaudible, _almost_ – “My saviour.” 

“Regina...” Emma trails off, leaning into the hand on her cheek. There’s so much she wants to say, too much, so she ends up not saying anything. 

“You’ve been so _strong_ ,” Regina says firmly, voice shaking. “And so brave. But it’s over now, Emma. You don’t have to fight anymore.”

Emma tries to look away, but she’s always had a lapse in willpower when it comes to this woman. 

“Please, Emma.” Regina sighs. “Stop fighting.”

The words lodge tightly in her throat. They don’t want to come out. Tears burn in her eyes. “I can’t.”

Regina falters, beautiful face collapsing into a resigned sigh. “I know.”

A hand comes up to her face again, for a second, and when it leaves Regina’s pulling away. 

“Don’t leave,” Emma says. Her voice always catches in her throat. “Please.”

A sad smile graces Regina’s lips, but she’s already fading away. Such is the nature of the dream.

“I -” Emma begins. Her heart is thudding, panicky. “I...”

Part of Emma knows she’ll stay if she just finds the courage to say the three little words that will keep her there. Part of her knows the same might be true of real life. But the bigger part of her, the part that’s growing harder to bear every day, is too scared. 

_Some Saviour_ , she thinks, and even though it’s a dream, there’s a note of truth to the way the thought burns behind her eyes and in her throat. 

The truth is, Emma ‘s scared if she says it in her dream she might say it in real life. Say it – think it, feel it, brave it, live it. 

And she can’t, and she’s weak, and the words die on her tongue. 

_I love you_ , she thinks, and the edges of her heart start to burn. 

_I love you_ , she thinks. _God, do I love you_. 

And she wakes up, and she lives her life. 

(Every day is pretty much the same, but every night is too. That much, Emma thinks, she's grateful for.)


End file.
